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Shhalahr Windrider
2007-11-18, 07:45 PM
It has always seemed to me that there was a problem with turning undead, both thematically and mechanically. The roots of this problem lie in the fact that a cleric must overcome a power level based on the undead's hit dice compared to the cleric's level.

The problem quickly becomes evident when one realizes that there is only a very loose correlation between Challenge Rating and Hit Dice. There are plenty of undead whose Challenge Rating is based on the creature's vast number of powerful special abilities. These undead inevitably have low Hit Dice for their Challenge Rating and are, therefore, easy to turn. Then there are creatures like zombies and skeletons whose Challenge Rating is derived solely from a high amount Hit Dice relative to their Challenge Rating and range from difficult to impossible to turn. On the whole, this makes Turn Undead mechanically useless at high levels as the sum of a particular undead's CR and Turn Resistance quickly exceed the levels a cleric can turn.

There is also a thematic problem. Did you notice how the creatures that are designed to be simple speed bumps—skeletons and zombies—are the hardest to turn? Meanwhile, the master-type undead that make up your BBEGs—liches, ghosts, vampires, etc.—are surprisingly simple? It makes no thematic or dramatic sense for the Master Necromancer lich to be easily turned by the party cleric just so they can clean up the impossible-to-turn mindless minions left behind.

"But, Shhalahr," you may say, "what about Turn Resistance? Master Undead have Turn Resistance to even out the score. In fact, it's there to represent the thematic difficulty of dealing with such powerhouses."

Well, you would be correct that Turn Resistance was included to model that concept. But the truth is it doesn't work out as intended. First of all, the Master Undead are often templates that result in many specimens having Hit Dice lower than their challenge rating. This means several points of a Master Undead's Turn Resistance go simply to filling a gap. Second, most Master Undead's effective Hit Dice to resist turning falls somewhere around its Challenge Rating +4. This means that unless the Master Undead in question is meant to be a near-overwhelming challenge (CR > Party Level), it is potentially turnable, given good luck on the cleric's part. But meanwhile, the skeletons the master undead command may have hit dice up to 14 greater than their challenge rating. This makes the mindless minions literally impossible to turn.

In the end, it remains paradoxically easier to deal with the supposedly more powerful undead.

So, what's the simplest fix for this Turning Paradox of Relative Power? Well, it seems to me one rating that measures a creature's power versus a party more accurately than Hit Dice is Challenge Rating. So what if we compared the result of a turn check and applied the turn damage against Undead Challenge Rating rather than Hit Dice? It would fix the situation quite nicely.

Challenge Rating 6 zombies with 20 Hit Dice will now be turnable by the sixth-level cleric that will be facing said zombies. Meanwhile, the 6 Hit Die, Challenge Rating 8 vampire BBEG with Turn Resistance 4 will force that cleric to fight him directly, as the vampire would be impossible to turn.

Now, the one objection I had to this solution is based in using a creature attribute only as it is meant to be. It is part of my idea of what constitutes Best Practices for design in a role-playing game. Challenge Rating is meant to be an aide for the DM to judge encounter difficulty and award experience. Beyond the experience award, it is never used for an in-game effect. And even then, it is only used for the most nebulous of in-game effects.

But then comes along Tome of Magic. Those familiar with Chapter 3 of Tome of Magic realize that it is no longer the case that Challenge Rating is a purely metagame attribute. In Tome of Magic, the Truenaming system of magic has taken to judging Truename check DCs based in part on a creature's Challenge Rating. And the best part is that it is straight from WotC. This results in an official recommendation from the game designers themselves that Challenge Rating can be fully embraced by a purely in-game concept.

So why not use Challenge Rating instead of Hit Dice? It's mechanically sound. It makes thematic sense. And it even works with what currently passes for game design theory. What's stopping us?

[hr]I sincerely doubt I am the first person to come up with this idea. However, I've yet to actually see it openly discussed. So I would just like a little input. See if there's anything I've missed in my analysis. Or maybe it's just perfect. Just let me know what you think.

shadow_archmagi
2007-11-18, 07:50 PM
Very interesting.

Azerian Kelimon
2007-11-18, 07:53 PM
I'd say there's only once stopping point there. And that's char advanced undead. Since their CR is increase per HD they get, and most char advanced undead have turning resistance. Suddenly, that lich that was intended as a challenge to the cleric makes it impossible for said cleric to utilize the power WoTC intended to be an important part of the cleric ('Sides healing. We all know BOTH of this focii turned to be utterly false, but let's not get into that).

de-trick
2007-11-18, 07:57 PM
I don't see how a party of 4 6th levels are suppose to fight a grey render zombie
when it has 20 d8 hitpoints

Azerian Kelimon
2007-11-18, 08:00 PM
Ever seen that weakness of zombies, only taking one standard or move action a round? Jus' hit 'n' run it.

martyboy74
2007-11-18, 08:34 PM
That's a really good idea. I think that the other option would be to painstaking go through every undead creature, and rework their turn resistance. Zombie/skeleton level creatures could even get negative turn resistance.

SadisticFishing
2007-11-18, 08:36 PM
Ever seen that weakness of zombies, only taking one standard or move action a round? Jus' hit 'n' run it.

Except they can still charge you =\

Azerian Kelimon
2007-11-18, 08:37 PM
Then, stay one extra square away. A standard action charge uses only your normal speed, not double.

SadisticFishing
2007-11-18, 08:39 PM
Without Spring Attack, that's very difficult to do for a meleer.

The ranged guys'll own em though.

Prometheus
2007-11-18, 08:39 PM
The fixing mechanism, it seems, would be simply to modify the turn resistance of everything, especially in a way so that it scales in a way that makes more sense (for example, skeletons would lose turning resistance per HD as their HD increases, and templates would increase turning resistance per HD as their HD increases).

Of course, this would be designed to mimic the conceptual equivalent, that is, more intelligent, wise, and/or charismatic should have greater innate resistance to positive energy than a mindless one. Of course though, this would be yet another contribution to a complicated subject.

KBF
2007-11-18, 08:47 PM
The fixing mechanism, it seems, would be simply to modify the turn resistance of everything, especially in a way so that it scales in a way that makes more sense (for example, skeletons would lose turning resistance per HD as their HD increases, and templates would increase turning resistance per HD as their HD increases).

Of course, this would be designed to mimic the conceptual equivalent, that is, more intelligent, wise, and/or charismatic should have greater innate resistance to positive energy than a mindless one. Of course though, this would be yet another contribution to a complicated subject.

Read the last paragraph of the OP please.

....
2007-11-18, 09:19 PM
Except they can still charge you =\


Attack, five-foot step back?

Sure, it might take awhile to kill it, but so what?

martyboy74
2007-11-18, 09:20 PM
Can't the zombie take a 5 foot step too?

SadisticFishing
2007-11-18, 09:22 PM
Yeah, they can take 5ft steps too.

So zombies aren't *quite* as easy as they pretend.

Chronos
2007-11-18, 09:40 PM
Suddenly, that lich that was intended as a challenge to the cleric makes it impossible for said cleric to utilize the power WoTC intended to be an important part of the clericDo you really think you should be able to turn a lich?

To the point at hand, though, the whole turning mechanic is just messed up. If you really wanted to fix it, just make it a spell-like ability that affects all undead in some area and offers a will save. The BBEG undead like liches (that shouldn't be easy to turn) will generally have good will saves, while the coffin fodder like zombies and skeletons won't.

Shhalahr Windrider
2007-11-18, 10:20 PM
I'd say there's only once stopping point there. And that's char advanced undead. Since their CR is increase per HD they get, and most char advanced undead have turning resistance. Suddenly, that lich that was intended as a challenge to the cleric makes it impossible for said cleric to utilize the power WoTC intended to be an important part of the cleric ('Sides healing. We all know BOTH of this focii turned to be utterly false, but let's not get into that).
I really don't see what you're getting at.

First of all, yeah, their CR does increase on a per-HD basis. Even under the core system, this lets it scale perfectly, as opposed to the typical mindless minion +1 CR/4 HD rate that makes mid-level zombies impossible to turn. In any case, what I propose doesn't change scaling at all for PC-classed Undead.

The only real effect what I propose has on PC-classed Undead is no different than giving them a small boost to whatever turn resistance they might have. As I mentioned above, such undead tend to have fewer HD than their Challenge Rating. So they do become marginally harder to turn.

But ultimately, that's the point. Undead with PC classes tend to be the Master Undead BBEG types I mentioned. They should be harder to turn.

Now, I realize that not every Vampire or Lich is really a BBEG, and it should be thematically easier to turn the minion vampires that work for the real BBEG. But this is easily represented by the fact that such minions will have a lower CR to begin with. Often times, such minions will fight as part of a group, which means their individual CRs will even be less than the party level.

Ultimately, it comes down to the Mindless Minions being incredibly easy to turn, the Coffin-Fodder being a maybe/maybe not turnable, the Faithful Leiutenants being difficult but not impossible to turn, and the BBEG pulling all their strings being outright impossible to turn. And that is how it should be.


If you really wanted to fix it, just make it a spell-like ability that affects all undead in some area and offers a will save. The BBEG undead like liches (that shouldn't be easy to turn) will generally have good will saves, while the coffin fodder like zombies and skeletons won't.
Still have the problem. Undead have good Will Saves, and coffin fodder have high hit dice. Their high base save more than makes up for their mediocre Wisdom scores.

Meanwhile, Master Undead won't have a good starting base save and will require better Wisdom than they even have now. So the Turning Paradox will still exist.

Nah, the beauty of the change outlined above is that you don't have to figure out the right way to scale special DCs or other effects. You just exchange one number from the already-existing stat-block for another.

osyluth
2007-11-18, 11:00 PM
In Complete Divine there's some alternate turning system that just deals straight-up damage.

Toliudar
2007-11-18, 11:12 PM
This seems like a simple, elegant and smart fix to a problem that I'd noticed but would never have been able to articulate so...articulately. Kudos! I'm using this!

Innis Cabal
2007-11-18, 11:13 PM
maybe to show they are stronger with class levels add either the class levels into turn resistance or if that is to insanly high add half

Chronos
2007-11-19, 12:05 AM
Still have the problem. Undead have good Will Saves, and coffin fodder have high hit dice. Their high base save more than makes up for their mediocre Wisdom scores.Hm, true. I would argue that things like skeletons and zombies shouldn't have any good saves at all, but that's piling on yet another change. I will say of your proposal that it's a very simple change, and it's definitely better than what exists now.

Roderick_BR
2007-11-19, 08:48 AM
Do you really think you should be able to turn a lich?

True. I saw somewhere someone showing a build for a 20th level cleric that could dust Vecna himself with one Turn roll.

Rad
2007-11-19, 09:18 AM
I really really like it!

On a side note; any ideas on the "destroying undead" side? It looks like the only levels in which you are allowed to destroy undead while turning them are 4-5. Why not to scale that up to cleric level -3 or cleric level -4?

Keld Denar
2007-11-19, 09:30 AM
True. I saw somewhere someone showing a build for a 20th level cleric that could dust Vecna himself with one Turn roll.

Yeah, stack a few levels of RSoP for the Glory Domain, and a few levels of Sacred Exorcist (undead), grab the feat Improved Turning, pick up the Sacred enhancement on both shield and armor, get a Phylactery of Undead Turning, and a Rod of Defiance. Buy an Ephod of Authority from the MIC. You now turn something like level +16 before rolling. A good roll (or a bad roll with enough +cha or +cha check items) nets you with another +4. So a level 20 cleric/RSoP/SE can nab undead that are around 40 HD. Have a friendly bard play a Lyre of Restful souls for another +4 efffectively. Because you have Sun Domain and levels in RSoP, that is a greater turning, which means that undead that are affected by turning are destroyed instead. I haven't seen any stats for Vecna, but I can't imagine him having too many more than 44 HD, even as a god. You can certainly dust all of his aspects and avatars at will though.

And turning as a CR would get rediculously OP as a specialized turner. Imagine a cleric dusting a CR 40 creature, instead of just a 40 HD creature. Thats around enough to destroy that floating baby god fetus abomination over on d20srd.com. And its supposed to be an epic challenge, which barely lasts a single round vs a well prepared cleric.

And to the person who will undoubtedly say it. The cleric with the gear I mentioned above hasn't totally gimped himself out to do this trick. He's spent only a small portion of his WBL for a level 20 char to aquire this gear, most of the abilities and feats are standard cleric stuff anyway, and he still has full casting.

Leadfeathermcc
2007-11-19, 09:44 AM
In Complete Divine there's some alternate turning system that just deals straight-up damage.

Can you give a page number for that, I can not find it, and I would like to see that system as I have never been a fan of turning.

Edit: Found it on page 87, someday a WoTC book will come out with a decent index.

Nostri
2007-11-19, 09:56 AM
And turning as a CR would get rediculously OP as a specialized turner. Imagine a cleric dusting a CR 40 creature, instead of just a 40 HD creature. Thats around enough to destroy that floating baby god fetus abomination over on d20srd.com. And its supposed to be an epic challenge, which barely lasts a single round vs a well prepared cleric.


Even if you do this and make a specialized turning cleric so you can dust Vecna himself the CR for turning still works better in low to mid levels. (Even in high levels if you don't focus on turning which most people won't unless they know the campaign is going to include hordes of undead.) And as far as I'm concerned balancing comething in the low to mid levels is what truely counts as long as it still works in high levels since the game's just broken past ~12-15th level anyway.


And just for anyone that might be thinking it I'm not saying balance should be ignored past 12th level. What I'm saying that in RAW the system has a tendency to start to break down past at the higher end of mid levels and if not then than high levels. If there were a way to absolutley prevent this other then player and DM descrecion that would be wonderful but since there isn't when someone points out why something doesn't work because at 20th level with a half dozen PrCs and some very specialized equipment they can take advantage of the system I point them towards the crippled scholar with a couple of wierd books and the holy man with nothing but a prettily carved hunk of wood that can both change the way the universe work at that level, quite literally.

Shhalahr Windrider
2007-11-19, 01:00 PM
On a side note; any ideas on the "destroying undead" side? It looks like the only levels in which you are allowed to destroy undead while turning them are 4-5. Why not to scale that up to cleric level -3 or cleric level -4?
Meh, as-is with the HD, destroying just isn't an option past those levels anyway. Even the Master Undead with the low HD have more than half the cleric level.

If I were to do this I'd go with Cleric's Level -5 just because that doesn't show up on the "Most Powerful Undead Affected" turning chart. Doesn't seem right to have a totally sucky roll still result in the affected undead being automatically destroyed. Also keeps zombie horde style encounters from being too much a walk in the park.


Yeah, stack a few levels of RSoP for the Glory Domain, and a few levels of Sacred Exorcist (undead), grab the feat Improved Turning, pick up the Sacred enhancement on both shield and armor, get a Phylactery of Undead Turning, and a Rod of Defiance. Buy an Ephod of Authority from the MIC. You now turn something like level +16 before rolling. A good roll (or a bad roll with enough +cha or +cha check items) nets you with another +4.
Yeah, I suppose all those would require some rexamination. :smallwink: But the problem is those are all just basic requirements to turn plain old zombies at mid to high levels under the core system.


I haven't seen any stats for Vecna, but I can't imagine him having too many more than 44 HD, even as a god. You can certainly dust all of his aspects and avatars at will though.
In Deities and Demigods, he's listed as a Wizard 20/Cleric 20. With no other source of HD.

But as a god, Vecna doesn't even have a proper CR. The gods are simply "CR: Special", I guess. I would recommend that Vecna should really be immune to turning anyway.


And turning as a CR would get rediculously OP as a specialized turner. Imagine a cleric dusting a CR 40 creature, instead of just a 40 HD creature. Thats around enough to destroy that floating baby god fetus abomination over on d20srd.com. And its supposed to be an epic challenge, which barely lasts a single round vs a well prepared cleric.
You mean the Demilich? It only has 21 HD compared to its CR of 29. So under current rules you don't even need that much.

And where the Master Undead types are concerned, it only gets worse.


And to the person who will undoubtedly say it. The cleric with the gear I mentioned above hasn't totally gimped himself out to do this trick. He's spent only a small portion of his WBL for a level 20 char to aquire this gear, most of the abilities and feats are standard cleric stuff anyway, and he still has full casting.
Nah, he's not mechanically gimped. But he's lost any chance at any concept other than "Epic Undead Hunter."

Keld Denar
2007-11-19, 02:26 PM
Nah, he's not mechanically gimped. But he's lost any chance at any concept other than "Epic Undead Hunter."

How so? Radiant Servent makes him an excellent combat healer, with enough bang for his buck to make combat healing worthy of actions spent. Only 2 feats used (Extra Turning and Improved Turning) means hes still got 5-6 other feats to spend, on things like Power Attack, Divine Spell Power, Quicken Spell, or Extend Spell. Divine Spell Power takes strong advantage of the turning focus to power up spells cast almost automatically. Glory Domain gives Holy Sword and Bolt of Glory, which are very powerful spells otherwise unaccessable to a cleric. Sacred Exorcist gives some spell like abilities that are powerful vs outsiders and evil things in general. Some of the gold could easily be spent elsewhere, but armor is cheap, Rod of Defiance (counts as a heavy mace) can be weilded 2 handed for power attack after Divine Power is cast, and there is still plenty of gold left over after buying that gear to get other armor upgrades, a wisdom phylactery +6, a couple metamagic rods, and a handful of Pearls of Power.

This build is by no means "just an undead slayer" and nothing but. If I was playing in a level 20 game with almost NO undead, I would still appreciate this character at my table.

Sorry to drift off-topic a little.

As to normal turning and destroying undead...unless you have greater turnings, you have almost no chance to destroy undead that are worth turning. Some other method is needed to determine whether or not affected undead are turned or destroyed. As it stands, the current system is pretty much all or nothing.

Jasdoif
2007-11-19, 03:33 PM
You mean the Demilich? It only has 21 HD compared to its CR of 29. So under current rules you don't even need that much.The "floating baby god fetus" would be the atropal (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/abomination.htm#atropal), with its 66HD (and ability to bolster itself up to effectively 76) but only CR 30.


Anyway...I think the turning mechanic itself is clunky, even though shifting from CR to HD might fix something...I'd rather simplify the matter. So, more-or-less off the top of my head....
Turning does damage. Undead take a number of d6s in damage equal to your turning level minus the creature's turn resistance. If the number of dice is at least twice the creature's HD, it's automatically destroyed instead of needing a roll (primarily a matter of convenience, since mathematically (2k)d6 > (k)d12 and so the undead will probably die anyway).
Greater turning is like turning, except maximized (Use 6s instead of rolling d6s).
Bolstering will be simple, if your turning level is higher then the creature's HD then it gets turn resistance equal to your turning level minus its HD, unless it already has more turn resistance then that.Not sure how to handle rebuke/command.

Chronos
2007-11-19, 04:01 PM
In Deities and Demigods, he's listed as a Wizard 20/Cleric 20. With no other source of HD.Y'know, I've never understood deities with levels like this. With the same number of levels and a few prestige classes, you could make a deity which is effectively level 20 each in Wizard, Cleric, and Psion, plus nine levels of Sorcerer. Even sticking purely to core, you could still go Wiz 10/Clr 10/MT 10, leaving ten levels for rogue or barbarian or whatever. Yeah, there's some min/maxing there, but how do you think Vecna became a god?

tyckspoon
2007-11-19, 04:18 PM
The "floating baby god fetus" would be the atropal (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/abomination.htm#atropal), with its 66HD (and ability to bolster itself up to effectively 76) but only CR 30.


Anyway...I think the turning mechanic itself is clunky, even though shifting from CR to HD might fix something...I'd rather simplify the matter. So, more-or-less off the top of my head....
Turning does damage. Undead take a number of d6s in damage equal to your turning level minus the creature's turn resistance. If the number of dice is at least twice the creature's HD, it's automatically destroyed instead of needing a roll (primarily a matter of convenience, since mathematically (2k)d6 > (k)d12 and so the undead will probably die anyway).
Greater turning is like turning, except maximized (Use 6s instead of rolling d6s).
Bolstering will be simple, if your turning level is higher then the creature's HD then it gets turn resistance equal to your turning level minus its HD, unless it already has more turn resistance then that.Not sure how to handle rebuke/command.

This has exactly the same problem as the standard turning system. I think it's actually a little weaker, overall, although easier to deal with. 'Mook' undead, which have many more hit dice than their CR in order to make up for them otherwise sucking, will easily be able to eat the damage you inflict. Undead that get their CR by way of things other than raw HD might take enough damage to be slightly meaningful, but in the standard system, you would have taken them out of the fight. Turning as Damage offers the Cleric the chance to change his Turning effect from a low-chance save or lose to a guaranteed blasting.. unfortunately, blasting doesn't work very well.

Kaelik
2007-11-19, 04:34 PM
Y'know, I've never understood deities with levels like this. With the same number of levels and a few prestige classes, you could make a deity which is effectively level 20 each in Wizard, Cleric, and Psion, plus nine levels of Sorcerer. Even sticking purely to core, you could still go Wiz 10/Clr 10/MT 10, leaving ten levels for rogue or barbarian or whatever. Yeah, there's some min/maxing there, but how do you think Vecna became a god?

You have to remember that Deities and Demi-Gods was designed for the express purpose of having Gods you could kill. They don't actually want them to be too powerful (Except Boccob, he auto rolls 20s for everything. I don't even know why they bothered calculating his base saves.) Plus it makes sense to take 21 levels of Wizard, and then go somewhere Cleric, it's better then getting there with Theurge. (Although, you'd think God's would be able to reorder their levels after then ascend.)

Disclaimer: I don't know what to do in with Epic levels because I never read the rules more then was needed to realize that all spells were quickened and Epic Spellcasting is even more broken then regular, so I don't actually know what's optimal, I was just saying that pre epic straight Wizard makes sense.

Shhalahr Windrider
2007-11-19, 05:35 PM
How so?
A significant number of feats and all domains are all chosen with the express intention of boost turning ability. Even the more general purpose abilities the class levels grant are primarily geared for undead fighting. They just happen to be able catch a number of other things as well. Kinda like how a Ghostbuster's proton back is good for destroying just about anything but it's primary purpose is fighting ghosts.


As to normal turning and destroying undead...unless you have greater turnings, you have almost no chance to destroy undead that are worth turning.
It would be overpowered to really put undead that are worth turning in the destroyable range. The concept of destroying undead with turning is really just about clearing the battle field of undead whose only function is to form a moving wall. Y'know, so your fighter has a clear path to charge. It's for horde fighting.


Y'know, I've never understood deities with levels like this. With the same number of levels and a few prestige classes, you could make a deity which is effectively level 20 each in Wizard, Cleric, and Psion, plus nine levels of Sorcerer.
Well, I think the goal was to get folks to focus on the purely divine stuff. They didn't want to distract readers with complex builds using (RAW optional) prestige classes or mesty Epic progressions.

By all rights Vecna would probably be better modelled Wizard/various wizard Prestige Classes.


Yeah, there's some min/maxing there, but how do you think Vecna became a god?
He died and then a bunch of people started worshipping him, which caused his spirit to gain godhood status....

Oh. It was rhetorical. :smalltongue:


This has exactly the same problem as the standard turning system.
Right. Once again, the mindless minions have far more hit dice and, therefore, hit points, than the master undead. Attacking the hit points solves nothing where the paradox is concerned.


You have to remember that Deities and Demi-Gods was designed for the express purpose of having Gods you could kill.
Nah. If PCs were actually meant to go up against deities, the gods would have been given Challenge Ratings.

It's more of a tool to figure out exactly how the gods can affect the world. And to players a chance to say "My patron deity can beat up your patron deity" and then back it up with proof.


They don't actually want them to be too powerful (Except Boccob, he auto rolls 20s for everything. I don't even know why they bothered calculating his base saves.)
Auto 20s are for every greater deity.

And it's an auto result of 20. Not an auto natural 20. So if Boccob had a +60 Fort save, he'd automatically succeed on any DC 80 or lower Fort save but would still have to roll for that nat 20 on DC 81 or higher.

Jasdoif
2007-11-19, 07:16 PM
Right. Once again, the mindless minions have far more hit dice and, therefore, hit points, than the master undead. Attacking the hit points solves nothing where the paradox is concerned.Well...HD-heavy undead would be affected instead of being untouchable, and CR-heavy undead would have a chance at surviving instead of being routinely one-shotted. It's the same "problem", yes, but the effects are less extreme...and it doesn't rely on those clunky mechanics either. It's an improvement on some level, at the very least.


But I apparently didn't catch your real problem earlier, and I have to question the rationale of your intent. 20HD zombies are supposed to be tough, that's why they have 20 hit dice. And their lich masters aren't as resilient, that's probably why they have zombie minions in the first place.

I find it incongruous to expect that a hulking 20HD zombie (CR 6) would be as susceptible to turning as a ghoul wizard 4 (CR 4 and +2 turn resistance). If you believe otherwise, perhaps the problem lies elsewhere in the system.

Shhalahr Windrider
2007-11-19, 07:32 PM
20HD zombies are supposed to be tough, that's why they have 20 hit dice.
But they aren't supposed to be as tough as a 16th level lich wizard. So why should it take as much power to turn one as it does the other?


And their lich masters aren't as resilient, that's probably why they have zombie minions in the first place.
Actually, their lich masters are more resilient in general (i.e. in every way except turning), but it's due to spells and special abilities than just excess meat. That's why the lich that animated the CR 6 zombie has a CR of at least 12.


I find it incongruous to expect that a hulking 20HD zombie (CR 6) would be as susceptible to turning as a ghoul wizard 4 (CR 4 and +2 turn resistance). If you believe otherwise, perhaps the problem lies elsewhere in the system.
The hulking zombie's just a bunch of rotting meat. That's all its hit dice represent in the ways of toughness. Nothing special about it.

The ghoul is cunning and intelligent and likely has an even stronger connection to the Negative Energy Plane in this way.

tyckspoon
2007-11-19, 08:24 PM
But I apparently didn't catch your real problem earlier, and I have to question the rationale of your intent. 20HD zombies are supposed to be tough, that's why they have 20 hit dice. And their lich masters aren't as resilient, that's probably why they have zombie minions in the first place.

I find it incongruous to expect that a hulking 20HD zombie (CR 6) would be as susceptible to turning as a ghoul wizard 4 (CR 4 and +2 turn resistance). If you believe otherwise, perhaps the problem lies elsewhere in the system.

A level 6 cleric should be able to use his anti-undead class feature to achieve something useful against a CR 6 undead. Doing 6d6 damage against 20d12 HD is only marginally more useful than doing nothing at all with a normal turning check. Both are less useful than what the cleric could achieve by ignoring Turn Undead completely and casting a spell instead (or perhaps using a Divine feat to turn one of those borkened Turn uses into something useful.)

Jasdoif
2007-11-19, 09:59 PM
But they aren't supposed to be as tough as a 16th level lich wizard. So why should it take as much power to turn one as it does the other?

Actually, their lich masters are more resilient in general (i.e. in every way except turning), but it's due to spells and special abilities than just excess meat. That's why the lich that animated the CR 6 zombie has a CR of at least 12....at this point I think we're divided on what "tough" means, in this particular instance. I guess it also depends on how you envision turning is supposed to work...but now that I remember turning is more akin to mental coercion then flooding undead with positive energy, I guess physical toughness is irrelevant. OK, that marks against plain ol' HD comparisons....

My main concern, I guess, is...well, how CR is typically used, and your prior mention of turning being meant for "field control". If a 6th cleric can handle a CR 6 undead creature reliably, what happens when there's 2 CR 4? Or 4 CR 2? Now, a CR 2 zombie has 6 HD, so a level 6 cleric with standard turning would have a good shot at turning them, perhaps even three of them with a single attempt if the dice (and Cha mod) are right. Same with a 4th level cleric vs 4 CR 1 (4-HD) zombies...hmm. Now I can't help but wonder if this is coincidence, or if group-of-4-zombies was the measuring stick for turning or zombie CR.

I agree with your statement in the OP about how using CR to influence the in-game is inelegant at best. It also (speaking of what I've been able to determine about Truenaming) feels like a forced attempt to accommodate the disparity between CR and HD. HD plays a part in the most basic defenses: hit points and save bonuses. CR...does not. Using CR as a mechanic effectively puts the entire "fair" playing field onto one single term, or lower in the case of multiple creatures in an encounter. It cuts down on needing to select a variety of approaches, as something that's routinely above your attempts either has special resistance to your ability or you were going to die anyway.

You're right, turning needs an overhaul of some sort, but while your proposal has some merit I don't think it's quite it. Of course, I don't have any genuinely better ideas....

Shhalahr Windrider
2007-11-19, 10:03 PM
A level 6 cleric should be able to use his anti-undead class feature to achieve something useful against a CR 6 undead.
Y'know, it's so simple, yet I had such trouble with coming up with such direct phrasing. :smallredface: This is the mechanical issue I've been talking about.

Thanks for putting it so succinctly, tyckspoon. :smallbiggrin:

Jasdoif
2007-11-20, 04:17 PM
Thinking over this some more...I realize that I don't really see turn undead as being a primary class feature. I think it's more of a "flavorful" mechanic, like a druid's Resist Nature's Lure or a paladin's Remove Disease. Simply put, a cleric is a full caster with effectively free access to an expansive spell list; Turn Undead is simply some situational icing on the cake. Serving primarily as a convenience mechanism against large numbers of weaker undead that would otherwise be more time-and-resource-consuming then they're actually worth.

Looks like that's all been long buried, though....Now turn attempts can power far more effective things, rogues have ways to get sneak attack vs undead, and so on. It's no wonder DMM is popular, it turns a flavory class feature into a superboost for a primary class feature.

Keld Denar
2007-11-21, 11:13 AM
The problem with turning-as-damage, is that you could concievably hire out an entire church of Pelor's contingent of 1st and 2nd acolytes, take em too a dungeon, and have them all use their greater turning attemt to deal 6*#clerics to all bad guys. 20 clerics would net you 120 damage, with the numbers only getting sillier from there. And thats if they all rolled average and got cleric level +0. If they all had at least a 14 cha, then that damage pretty much doubles.

Turning-as-CR seems like a pretty decent work around some of the time though. It'll be interesting to see what happens to turn undead in 4e. I doubt they'll nix the concept, its been something that has been around since the start. Maybe all undead will be assigned an "effective turn DC" that is arbitrarily assigned based on their resilliance, rather than a function of HD or CR. The cleric would roll vs that number, with bonus effects if they exceeded that number by X.

Kaelik
2007-11-21, 01:02 PM
The problem with turning-as-damage, is that you could concievably hire out an entire church of Pelor's contingent of 1st and 2nd acolytes, take em too a dungeon, and have them all use their greater turning attemt to deal 6*#clerics to all bad guys. 20 clerics would net you 120 damage, with the numbers only getting sillier from there. And thats if they all rolled average and got cleric level +0. If they all had at least a 14 cha, then that damage pretty much doubles.

There is not "getting Cleric level +0" and Charisma doesn't increase the amount of damage dealt under that variant. Read the rules, they do Xd6 where X is Cleric level. Period.